Law without Lawyers, Lawyers without Law

Luca Siliquini-Cinelli thinks that there can be law without lawyers. American legal realism thinks that there can be lawyers without law. The truth is perhaps somewhere in between. Law forces individuals to fit into categorical rules. Focusing on its Procrusteanism leads one to imagine the possibility of law without lawyers: law is a set of rules, albeit a complex set, that can be applied consistently to a whole array of situations. But law can also take on shifting shapes and forms to suit the circumstances. Focusing on its Proteanism leads one to imagine the possibility of lawyers without law: law is just whatever lawyers make it out to be. Perhaps law is somewhere between Procrustean and Protean. Therefore, Siliquini-Cinelli and American legal realism may, each, be half-right. Keywords: legal realism; law; lawyers; logic; knowledge; experience; Holmes.